OK I thought I would throw this out and put it up for opinions and suggestions.

Here is my situation and some options I have been considering. I have an 18 ft. bumper pull travel trailer that I pulled around last summer with a Chevy 1500 5.7 (350). I have since then traded trucks for the one in my sig.

It worked ok but it was working that Chevy pretty hard. (3.73 axle ratio). I think it's more wind drag than weight. My delemma is, my wife and I would like to get the trail rig (Suzuki Samurai) to where we are going. It's much more fun to run around in and gets better mpg.

I posted in the towing section and I'm pretty sure with some trial and error I will be able to, either flat tow the sammy behind the tt, or put it on a trailer and tow it behind the tt. I prefer the second method to save tire wear on the off road tires.

The other option I am considering is to put a flat bed on my truck, load the sammy on it and tow the tt as normal. The sammy weighs 2200 lbs. (on certified scales) My concern is the weight will be fairly high and I may encounter some stability issues. I wonder if I can put duel tires in the rear to help in stability? My truck has 4.10 gears and should be able to pull both. Not 75mph but at reasonable speeds. I'm looking for anything to consider before I move forward with spending money on one of my options.

Any comments or suggestions?

 

From what I understand most states, if not all of them won't let you tow anything behind a bumper pull type trailer. If you want to do that buy a fithwheel travel trailer and then put the sammy on a flat bed or car trailer behind that.

The truck could carry that much weight if you have the heavy duty one, What is your GVWR on the sticker inside the drivers side door jamb? May need overloads or air bags but it would be kinda top heavy.

I wanted to pull our boat (16' w/inboard motor, not real heavy) behind our 30' bumper pull travel trailer but it is not allowed, DMV stated be lucky if I found any state that allowed it when I started to complain about it.

I'd bet there is some but the chance you live in one....

 

Oh for a while we had a 11.5' side in camper, it weighed 4010lbs (weighed on a certified scale). The 87 F250 in my sig has a GVWR of 8600lbs and it carried it just fine. Could cruse the highway at 70 mph no problem. And that truck has no sway bars on it, probably been better with them!

 

Idaho only has a max. length law. I would be well under that. A 4000lbs camper would be pretty top heavy too huh? I'll have to look but for some reason 10,000 sticks in my head as the GVWR. I could be wrong though. It is a heavy F250 with full floating axles on the rear.

 

I would consider a 5th wheel trailer but we just bought this one new and I don't want to take that kind of a hit by trading. Plus it's an "ultra lite" only weighs 3300lbs dry. That's an advantage getting it into back country places.

 

Yea it was kinda top heavy but I taught my wife to load it with the heavy stuff down low and light stuff up high to minimize it. Wasn’t a problem, I was real surprised to find out how much it did weigh. Didn’t find out until just before we sold it. Just didn’t “feel” like that much weight going down the road.

I was thinking adding over loads or air bags because of the added weight of the trailer but if you have and use a weight transfer hitch you may not need any.

 

Well I don't see a problem going either way but being as your state allows it, I'd pull the weight rather than carry it. I went to a trailer myself for just that reason.

My wife tows the boat with her car, we don't go all that far anyway most the time. Plenty of places to "get away" within a few minutes of here.

 

I hear ya there, we were running to all the areas near by just about every weekend and we would drive the sammy but we are venturung further away now. It is usually within 150 miles or so.